The first of December was a day of firsts.

It was my first encounter with HBO therapy.
No, HBO therapy isn’t sitting around watching The Sopranos and Mad Men.

Rather, it’s being placed into a tube that’s filled with complete and pure oxygen. It’s commonly used for burn victims, gangrene and to promote the body’s ability to fight chronic infection – which is me.

Hyperbaric Oxygen Therapy: What It Is & Benefits, Side Effects

Yes, I am a walking and talking homunculus for an infection. My surgical hardware is, allegedly, seeded. That infects the bone, which infects the hardware… and around and around it goes.

The hardware is attached to the bone and can’t be removed because the bone is spongy and weak from osteoporosis.

So, I must continue to host the infection until such a time when the liability doctors feel that I won’t be a high risk.

The HBO therapy is supposed to help the antibiotics fight the infection as oxygen promotes muscle growth.

In theory, I guess.
Of course, when I become resistant to the antibiotics, I’m fairly doomed anyway.

At least, that’s how I understand it.

The HBO thing caused some anxiety for a couple of reasons – I’d be bored out of my skull. It’s difficult for me to just sit still, let alone lie uncomfortably on a gurney-type bed for multiple hours. The curved spine and open wounds do not make that fun. Actually, it’s fairly painful.

I was also concerned about baseline issues – like going to the bathroom. Once enveloped in oxygen, it takes about seven minutes to return to ‘room air.’ If I got to go, I got to go – NOW. Irritated bladder issue. I can’t wait to get home if I got to go, let alone ten minutes plus plus plus.

To prepare, I did the first session as dehydrated as I possibly could.

That wasn’t fun either, but at least I managed to salvage a little dignity.

——— Theoretically, I should undergo this at least three times a week. But wait- there’s more!

The therapy places a lot of pressure on the eardrums.
Mine can’t handle it and I need tubes.

I’ve never had tubes in my ears or anywhere else, I don’t think. It’s a simple procedure, I’ve been told by multiple people. Just a quick numb, insert, and go.

I didn’t get past the numbing part.

To provide myself some grace, I was seriously in fight mode. Still a bit anxious about the HBO thing, hyper self-loathing about the infection, one of the wounds opening even more, and upset about the tubes, it had been a long day.

When I felt the tip of the needle in my inner ear, everything welled up. I shrieked. The doctor backed off.

It was determined that I need surgery, not an office visit, so I could be sedated. I was charged with having a mini-panic attack.

Without the tubes, I can’t continue with the HBO stuff.

And so the house of leaves — can’t even call them cards — came crashing.

That – that’s okay.

What’s not okay is that I lost control.
It was a tough day. It was long. And just – losing it – right at the end – is shameful. It’s embarrassing.

It’s not me but apparently it is because I did it.

And now I feel self-defeated, compromised, and I have disappointed everyone – although they assure me that I did not.

I sent the wound care nurse Amy into a frenzy to find a hospital that would schedule before February, as, apparently, my perilous situation became more perilous with the increased wound exposure.

I think that she’s already found a place that can get me in within a couple of weeks instead of months. I am to meet with them tomorrow.

But, at this juncture, I just want to be left alone.
I want to crawl into my hole and just scream. I feel like I want to cry, to lash out, and to work myself into a situation where I am physically and mentally flat. Tired. Unconscious.

That’s what I want.

Needs before wants.

Strength before sorrow.

Without the little sister, mom, and Jason, I don’t think I would have the strength.

I don’t want to do all of this for myself.
I need to do it for them. They don’t need or want a continual disappointment.